U.S. Gold Supply at 160 Tonnes: Nevada, Alaska and a Changing Map

United States gold mine production totalled an estimated 160 tonnes in

2025, valued at US$17 billion — a 32 percent rise in value year-on-year

driven by price rather than volume. Nevada delivered 64 percent of the

total, Alaska 22 percent, and the rest of the country the remaining 14.

The USGS's 2026 Mineral Commodity Summaries describes a concentrated,

stable industry with specific growth options.¹

Nevada's 64 Percent

Nevada is the undisputed centre of American gold. In 2025, the state

accounted for roughly 64 percent of U.S. gold output, drawn from a

cluster of open-pit and underground mines along the Carlin Trend, the

Getchell Trend and the Walker Lane — structural corridors that have

produced continuously since the late 1960s.¹

The geological model is understood in detail. Carlin-type disseminated

gold systems, characterised by fine-grained gold hosted in sedimentary

rocks altered by hydrothermal fluids, are the signature deposit style of

Nevada's production base. The mines are large, the grades are moderate,

and the infrastructure is mature. What has changed over the past decade

is the capital intensity: operators have increasingly invested in

underground expansions and in sulphide-treatment circuits to extend mine

lives as oxide resources have been drawn down.

The corporate structure in Nevada has also simplified. Through a joint

venture and a series of consolidation moves, the two largest global gold

majors — Barrick and Newmont — together control most of the state's

producing capacity. That concentration is a quiet advantage in terms of

operational coordination and capital discipline, though it also means

that any setback at either major can visibly move the national output

number.

Alaska's Rising Share

Alaska produced roughly 22 percent of U.S. gold in 2025 — a share that

has grown steadily over the past decade as several large operations have

scaled up. The state hosts both large hard-rock mines and a group of

significant placer operations, particularly in the Fairbanks and Circle

districts.¹

The operational context in Alaska is more demanding than Nevada's.

Cold-weather logistics, limited road access, higher fuel and labour

costs and a specific set of federal and state permitting pathways all

raise the bar for new projects. But the geological endowment is

substantial, and at 2025 prices several marginal projects have become

economic that were not in 2020.

Two of the flagship Alaskan operations were designated as Federal

Transparency Projects under the Fixing America's Surface Transport Act

during 2025, which aims to shorten permitting timelines. The designation

is an administrative signal rather than a production change, but it

suggests that federal policy-makers see Alaskan gold as a strategic

growth category.

Alaska also benefits from structural factors beyond geology.

Road-building and port investments associated with broader

critical-minerals initiatives — particularly around copper, rare earths

and antimony — create shared infrastructure that gold projects can use.

A small mine in a remote district is much more economical when it shares

a highway, a processing camp or a power line with a critical-minerals

operation nearby, and the policy push since 2024 has been funding

exactly that kind of shared infrastructure.

The Copper By-Product Block

About 7 percent of U.S. gold is recovered as a by-product of domestic

base-metal processing, chiefly from copper ores.¹ That share is smaller

than Brazil's comparable ratio, but it is not negligible. Domestic

porphyry-copper operations — primarily in Arizona, Utah and New Mexico —

contribute steady ounces regardless of the gold price cycle, in the same

way that Sossego and Salobo do for Brazil.

The by-product supply is important for a different reason. The USGS's

2025 assessment notes that nearly a quarter of U.S. undiscovered gold

resources is estimated to be contained in porphyry-copper deposits.¹ Any

future growth in U.S. copper output, especially through greenfield

porphyry projects, will quietly deliver additional gold as a

side-effect.

Concentration Among Top 25

Production in the United States is concentrated in a relatively small

number of very large operations. According to the USGS, the top 25

mining operations accounted for about 94 percent of gold mined in the

country during 2025.¹ That is a concentration ratio that would be

considered extreme in most other industries; in gold, it is the norm in

jurisdictions where scale rather than grade is the operational model.

The implication is that a handful of operational decisions — a capex

approval at Barrick's Cortez complex, a mine-life extension at Newmont's

Carlin district operations, a commissioning delay at a major Alaskan

project — can move the national number visibly. Investors in U.S. gold

equities face a consequence of that concentration: their exposure is

often closely tied to a specific production district.

The Longer-Term Resource Picture

The United States remains an exceptionally well-endowed gold

jurisdiction. A USGS national assessment identifies roughly 33,000

tonnes of U.S. gold resources — 15,000 tonnes in identified resources

and 18,000 tonnes in undiscovered resources.¹ For context, the world's

total identified reserves are 66,000 tonnes according to the same 2026

report, and the U.S. share of global resources is therefore significant

even though it contributes only about 5 percent of current annual mine

production.

The gap between the U.S. resource base and current production means

there is meaningful growth potential, but also that much of the

undiscovered resource sits in porphyry-copper systems rather than in

conventional gold deposits. Unlocking that resource depends on

exploration investment, permitting reform and processing infrastructure

that can handle complex polymetallic ores. None of these are short-term

projects.

Outlook

U.S. gold production has been remarkably st